Hannah Hoch: a Familiar Struggle, a Unique Point of View
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Hannah Hoch: A Familiar Struggle, A Unique Point of View Viki D. Thompson Wyltler Mos1 art his1orical discussions of the Berlin Dada remarks about her male Berlin Dadaist colleagues have movernenl (ca. 1918- 1922) have conjured visions of, nurtured a slowly deepening interest in her career, provid among others, Johannes Baader. Wieland Herzfelde, John ing 1he beginning of a somewhat different picture of some Heartfield, Richard Huelsenbeck, George Grosz, or Raoul of the 01her Berl in Dadaists. Her own words coupled with a Hausmann as 1hey sarcastically. enthusiastically, even variously motivated bul rekindled interest in her artwork wildly flou1cd the system. 1l1ey have been described as have resulted in the understanding that Hannah Hoch shocking and 1aun1ing lhe Berlin art world and its public possessed a unique poin1 of view as the female voice and in10 a new image of itself. The often favorable rccollcc1ions vision in this male-dominated movement. 8 of 1hosc aggressive assaults on lhe complacencies of ac Joining 1he Dada movement in Berli n in 1918, Hoch cepted \\llstem tradition have created the impression of had originally come 10 the city in 1912 at !he age of 23 to Berlin as an artistic battleground. The auempted destruction study art. Leaving her home town of Goth a, she had of 1raditional art has been seen as parallel and in reaction 10 enrolled at the School of Aris and Crafts (Kunstgewer the unhealthy political climate in Berlin at the time: it has beschule) and also had studied with lhe ar1is1 Emil Orlik. In also been viewed as rcla1ed 10 lhe destruction of people and 1915 at age 26, she met Raoul Hausmann with whom she property during World \½Ir I. However, the Dada forces of became involved personally and artistically for the next anti-art have also been described as containing inherent seven years. About the same time as the adoption of !he hope. the desire to build a new ari upon the destruction of Dadaist program. apparently triggered by Huclsenbeck 's the old. return to Berlin from the activities at the Cafe \-bltairc in Usually the composite picture of the Berlin Dadaists Zurich, she, Raoul Hausmann, John Heartfield, George has been made to look like a loosely assembled but noble, Grosz. and Johannes Baader began 10 experiment wilh and well-meaning group of art guerillas achieving a kind of expand a new technique, photomontage.9 Hoch and victory with male artists using demanding, confrontive. and Hausmann have separately given reminiscences of coming aggressive 'masculine' tactics. In the pa..~t twenty-five years, upon !he genesis for photomontage. the "military me however, tentative changes in that picture have surfaced. mento,··•• photographs done for the soldiers of the Prussian As a result of !he rise of feminist scholarship, attention army in which the photographed heads of the soldiers were has been focused on the all-bu1-forgo11en history of female superimposed on a grandiose scene." In 1919 and 1920 artists. ' In particular !his emphasis has helped to tip the Hoch exhibited in the First Berlin Dada Exhibition and the ,cale in favor of a renewed assessmcn12 of the work, li fe, First Dada International Fair (Figure I). 12 In 1922 the Berlin .rnd tactics of Hannah Hoch, tl1e female Berlin Dadaist,' an Dadaist panicipants began to degroup. During !his period 1rtis1 generally mentioned briefly and secondarily in most Hoch not only broke from her relationship wilh Hausmann. discussions of 1he period. The women 's movement has not but began "to try [her] hand at ·Mcr,bilder' ... , the san1c been the sole catalys1 for !his growing interest in Hoch. kind of collage as those of [her) friend Schwi11ers. " 13 Although it has been the mos1 recent influence, the late Appearances have sugges1ed lha1 Hannah Hoch fol fi fties and early sixties began a renewed and continuing' lowed Raoul Hausmann into tbe rebellious world of Dada, m1eres1 in Dadaism itself. Kenneth Couns-Smith reasoned and citations like Rich1cr's off-hand reference to Hausmann in 1970 in his book Dada that review of 1his historical art as HOCh's mentor in Dadd, A11 tmd Anti-Ar1 1" have ex movement was partially due to parallels in the political tended into the twentieth century 1he now-familiar adage climate be1wecn the post World 'l½r I era (especially in referred 10 in Greer's The Obstacle Race. Greer's observa Germany) and the intcmational situation in the mid-fifties tion was that "women who made names for themselves as after %rid War 11: Cou11s-Smi1h referred to .. ,he Korean painters before the nine1cen1h century ... were related to War. the Bomb. and .. Kruschev's revelations at the 20th belier-known male painters.... " 15 Although Greer was Party Congress in 1956 . ....., The ari work of the 1imc speaking predominantly of daugh1ers, the relationship occa from Rauschenburg, Cage. Tinguely. Klein, e l al., reflected sionally extended to wives. even a sister-in-law, and cer the look backward,6 and so did art criticism. tainly to students of recognized masters. 16 As the nineteenth Edouard Roditi ·s interview with Hannah Hoch ap century approached, "love·· relationships between male and peared in 1959 in Arts Ma&azine. Roditi 's motive was his female artist~ began 10 replace the older associations. These intcres1 in the over-all Berlin Dada scene and 1he fact !hat new connections did or did not end in marriage. 17 Nev Hoch owned a "unique collection of documents and relics ertheless, for women a traditional method of entry into the of the heyday of 1he Berlin Dada movement. .. To him she art world had apparently been established lhrough a male •aJone seem[ed] to possess enough of this material to liaison and this in turn had and has affected lhe public 's be able 10 look back on the whole movement objcc- view of 1he female ·s professional artistic activity as well. 1ively.... ·· 7 Although Roditi ·s interest in Hoch 's work Examples of well-known art couples of the twentieth seemed subordinated, her sometimes surprising and candid century have included Gabrielle Munter and \Vassily Kan- JJ dinsky, Frieda Kahlo and Diego Rivera, Sophie Tauber and ranking government pos1t1on. albeit assuming what now Hans Arp, Sonia Terk and Roben Delaunay, Lee Krasner seems a role connected with the traditional women's sphere, and Jackson Pollock. Commissar of Social \¼!I fare; in addition, Che Berlin Unlike several of che oeher women in these famous Dadaists openly sided witl1 the Communist party, were e,•en couple relationships, for inscancc Muncer or Krasner, who known as "Cultural Bolshevists. "24 actually assisccd in the overshadowing process Chrough !heir Several Berlin Dadaists, John Heartfield. Wieland own devotion co their husband's/lover's work and repuca Herzfelde, and George Grosz, joined the Communist pany, tions, Hoch did not; she continued in her relationship with John Heanfield receiving honors from East Germany after Hausmann for only seven years. After leaving him, she Y.brld \¼r II. Alehough Hcrzfelde and Hcartfield were the never struck up such a relationship again. Her connections only two who remained communists, the first Dada exhibi with other male colleagues seemed strictly friendship, her tion in 1919 cenainly identified the Berl in Dadaist move association with Schwiners a case in point. Hoch had come ment as such. They exhibited "subversive slogans" like to Berlin alone, against her faeher's objections, co attend art "Dada stands on the side of the revolutionary Proletariat" or school. She may have played Che hostess role ac Hausmann 's "Dada is the voluntary desc.ruction of the bourgeois world of soirees, according to Hans Richcer·s recollections, 1• but her ideas. "25 ocher accions bespoke an indepcndenc spiric. In Che 1959 In Prance in 1906 these years of female upheaval and interview with Roditi she complained, "Mose of our male progress also produced a Recrospective Exposition of colleagues concinued for a long while to look upon us Female An about which an anicle was printed in 1he [speaking also of Munter] as charming and gifted amateurs, Gazette des 8 ea11x Am in 1908. As Greer pointed out in The denying us implicitly any real professional scacus. " Obswc/e Race. this exhibit did not suddenly create a However, she gave high marks co Schwitters and Hans Arp widespread uneanhing and knowledge of Che history of as "rare examples of the kind of anist who can really treat a women's an,2• but ic cenainly would have added 10 the woman as a colleague. "' 9 Significantly. Hausmann was noc general societal factors of the time perhaps contributing 10 praised for this ability. the attitude of Hannah Hoch. and to the slowly growing These statements have seemed within a current context acceptance of and expectation that a female could be an to sound a fenlinist note. Although in the interview she also artist in her own right. In Chis vein. Hoch created collages frankly appraised her own more advanced development in using ·•women's" materials, sewing items, lace, pho 1915 in comparison to Hausmann ("But Hausmann re tographs from fashion magazines, for instance Tailor's mained until 1916 a figurative Expressionist . whereas I Flower (Sclmeiderblume). 1920. as well as works fully had already begun in 1915 co design and paint abstract exploring the psychology of a woman's position within compositions. ")20 and although she described Che \¼:stem culture, among others, Dada-Dance (Dada-Ta11:). Dadaist activity wich herself as a participant, not simply as a 1919- 21, 8011rgeois Wedding. 1920, La Mere. 1925. With sideline supponer of Hausmann, she did not acknowledge these works she added to 1he new atmosphere and to the here or later 21 any feminist inspiration for her independent nascent definition of a female point of view in art .